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Topic: Autonomous Racing League (Read 379 times)

This thread is dedicated to battles races between autonomous bots in Rawbots. It is intended to be a fun and friendly competition between bots and bot builders while providing a bit of spectacle to the Rawbots Club community. Building and programming an autonomous bot requires a fairly high level of effort, so be respectful to your fellow Rawboticists and above all have fun!

Competition/Construction Rules (subject to significant change):

No damage causing weapons. Ramming and flipping is allowed, but remember this is ultimately a race.

Jets, propellers, mass drives and other thrust sources are banned, both for propulsion and downforce.

Bind a key to start/stop the drive, weapons and aiming systems (use ‘X’)

Link a ‘spare’ Continuum to the rest of the bot via code (the ‘highlight’ color input is a good way to do this) so that the Continuums can be connected together to start all the bots simultaneously. Make it obvious which Continuum is the ‘spare’ one.

No Hypercube/Hypercannon weapons (possibly subject to revision if someone can come up with a convincing reason to allow them)

Ensure your bots are capable of reliably driving up and down ramps without assistance.

All bots must at least try to remain in contact with the track floor. (Getting airtime coming off ramps is fine, constant hovering is not).

Bots must be able to fit on a standard terrain hex. (actual dimensions up for debate)

The entry must consist of a single blueprint

Bots should be bluprinted in the correct orientation to be placed on the start grid

Make note of any special conditions with using your bot (keep these to a minimum!)

Suggestions:

Give your bot a name. It is much easier to refer to a bot called “Buzzcut” then “PressureLine’s bot with the laser saw.”

Choose a color. The ‘color_a’ of Floaters and ‘highlight’ of Continuums are good part choices for making your bot visually distinctive.

It is recommended to use a drive system that avoids unnecessary contact between bots to prevent a pile up right off the start line.

Creating Arenas:

Outer walls should be at least 2 hexes higher than the local track surface.

Ensure any switches or buttons are protected from the battle area to prevent accidental activation/deactivation.

Please note if the arena contains jumps or other more extreme obstacles where bots may flip.

Large amounts of grass can cause slowdowns, use it as a garnish only.

The start grid should be oriented the same way on all tracks to simplify placing bots on the grid

Bots cannot detect Lava or Ice separately from Earth/Metal. Use caution when placing these hexes in your arenas.

These are currently a draft set of rules. Please suggest any changes that you think would make races better.

Running races:

Download and use XFM v0.5, a mod that contains various fixes and rebalancing to make combat more interesting, as well as the addition of inverse trig functions (which will cause the game to crash if used on an version of Rawbots which does not have the functions availible)

Simply download the bots and the tracks, set up the bots on the grid and press Go!

Take pictures and videos, write battle reports and review competitors.

It is probably worth keeping this thread for entry announcements and results discussions. Please use the link coming soon for discussing the construction and programming of competing bots (feel free to debate the merits [or otherwise] of bots and tracks here though).